Junior teammates, then friends, now rivals
Steve Butler | November 26, 2007 | The Age
IT WAS on this balcony on a July day six years ago that a deep football friendship was born and two families dared to dream.
Matthew Kreuzer and Trent Cotchin were barely blips on the AFL radar when they met in 2001 as teammates in Victoria's under-12 team for a carnival at Albury.
But on Saturday, they were officially stamped as football's hottest new talents when the two close mates were snapped up at the head of the 2007 AFL draft.
Yesterday their respective fathers, Frank and Peter, sat on the same front balcony at the Cotchin family farm in Wollert, on Melbourne's northern fringe, as they did on the day the Albury carnival finished all those years ago.
Their joint dream has grown stronger with each successive representative team selection.
The lofty Kreuzers are the physical opposites of the more stocky Cotchins. The two boys are separated in age by almost a year, but their friendship is seamless, their will to achieve flawless and the earthy attitudes of their families a perfect foundation.
Peter Cotchin said that fateful meeting on his front porch would never be forgotten as both families settled in yesterday for the sporting ride of their lives.
"We struck up our friendship up at Albury because we were on a bit of common ground, I suppose," he recalled.
"When we came back we stood on this veranda and Frank just said to me, 'Mate, how good would it be if both of our kids played AFL one day?' I told him there was a long way to go yet, but yesterday was the day.
"It's been an unbelievable journey and an enjoyable journey, but as the boys got older it got pretty serious and it was hard watching them get tagged every week to try and shut them down.
"Everyone thinks their kid is the best kid going around, a lot of the parents don't talk any more and it's almost like a dog-eat-dog thing.
"There's nothing you can do as a parent apart from sit back and enjoy the ride and our friendship has been great."
The two families had partied apart into the early hours of yesterday morning, but were still buzzing when they came together just a few hours later when coffees were immediately followed by a beer.
But Kreuzer snr said the reality of their draft dream was still hazy, particularly as the 2008 season kicks off at the MCG on March 20 in a match between the two teams who selected their sons.
"The first thing Peter said to me was 'first game next year is Carlton and Richmond — your boy touches my boy, look out'," he laughed.
"When we got home from Telstra Dome on Saturday we were still asking ourselves whether it had really happened.
"We're just stoked and our feet haven't really touched the ground yet."
Both draftees were yesterday keeping a humble lid on their lot as the reality of their careers beckoned.
But Kreuzer revealed his clearly competitive streak when asked about an AFL debut that might be as early as round one.
"We've both got to try and get a game first and we'll see what happens. It will be weird, but if the ball's there, the ball's there and I'll be getting it," he said.
http://www.realfooty.com.au/news/news/junior-teammates-now-rivals/2007/11/25/1195975870019.html
